


Always Together

by Killer_Queen



Series: The Basement [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Loki Has Panic Attacks, Loki has nightmares, Natasha Romanov Is a Good Bro, Natasha has nightmares, Nightmares, Panic Attacks, friend zoned, friends look after each other, mental scars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-25
Updated: 2019-05-25
Packaged: 2020-03-14 16:52:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18952135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Killer_Queen/pseuds/Killer_Queen
Summary: (Please read the previous work “Never Alone” before reading this)Things seem to be returning to normal, but they aren’t. Things would never really be the same. Loki and Natasha have to face and heal the mental and physical scars from their time in the basement. As Loki is plagued by nightmares, Natasha faces the continued battle of friend zoning Clint.*sequel to “Never Alone”





	Always Together

**Author's Note:**

> Hi guys. I decided to write a sequel. I hope you like it!

Loki yawned as he woke up. He would NEVER get used to the noise of New York at night... The sounds of the cars roaring at all hours were enough to keep anyone up. Slowly, he pulled himself out of bed, stretching his long limbs. He looked in the mirror and examined the bandage near his hip. He peered underneath it. The wound was healing well, the stitches holding and the infection completely gone. The stupid infection that nearly killed him, the infection he got down in that wet and dim basement.  
The basement.  
It had been two weeks since they were rescued from that horrible place. Two wonderful, life giving weeks (excluding the days he spent in a hospital bed, recovering from his injuries). But even after two weeks, he hadn’t nearly forgotten about his ordeal. The opposite. He’d started having nightmares about it. About the cold, dirty water, sloshing around him as he moved. About the burning pain in his side, threatening to engulf him and eventually kill him despite his endless fight for life. About Natasha, sitting by him with a terrible look of worry and helplessness on her face. That was the worst nightmare. NEVER did he want to think of another time when Natasha looked as helpless as she had then. His life had been full of many strong and independent women. Lady Sif. His mother. Even Thor’s sweetheart Jane, in a way, the time’s that he’d met her when Thor actually bothered coming back to Earth to visit after weeks or months of wandering the universe looking for adventure. But Natasha was something different all together. She wasn’t just strong and independent. She’d fought her hardest to be that way, to be powerful and influential to all of those she met. She’d fought with every little bit of strength to be good, to change the perception others had of her. She reminded him of himself, the way he’d had to overhaul his entire reputation just so people would look at him without flinching or shuddering. She had scars. So did he. And neither of their scars were merely physical. They both had old mental scars from years of torture and torment.  
And more scars to come.

Natasha panted as she wiped away the sweat with a towel. She sipped from her drink bottle and slowly slipped a more covering top over her singlet, feeling self conscious as she did so. She’d never felt self conscious about wearing a singlet around Clint before, but things had changed in the last two weeks. Somehow, he’d been acting strange ever since she insisted he unhand her the day they were rescued. She’d finally noticed the way he looked at her whenever she wore something even slightly revealing (such as a singlet, which was really the most comfortable thing to train in). The way he seemed nervous every time they were alone, and whenever she talked, he seemed to be waiting for something, even expectant of her. She didn’t like this new Clint. Not one bit. She turned to leave, perhaps to finally have some breakfast, when Clint stopped her.  
“Nat, can I talk to you?” He asked. She shrugged.  
“Sure.” She said, slinging her back over her shoulder.  
“What happened to us?” He asked.  
“What do you mean ‘what happened to us’?” She replied.  
“Ever since you came back from that basement, you’ve been acting weird. You keep ignoring me, and you keep covering yourself up when I’m around. I’ve noticed.”  
“It’s nothing, Clint. I’ve just been more careful with my appearance lately.” She said, feeling her cheeks burn. Had she hurt him by pushing him away?  
“Natasha, you have NEVER been careful with your appearance. Now, tell me. Really. What happened to us?”  
She finally realised what he meant.  
“Clint, there never was an ‘us’” She said, getting ready to walk away.  
“Well, not officially, but I always felt that we had a special connection in that way. Didn’t you ever feel it?”  
“Clint, I’m so, so sorry, but I’ve never felt that way about you. You’re my best friend. That’s it.” Natasha said, her voice fading a little. What had she become, hurting Clint like this with what was...the truth.  
“Nat, what happened to you down there?”  
“Nothing happened. Nothing important, anyway.”  
“It’s Loki, isn’t it? You took a fancy to him when you were down there.”  
“No!”  
Natasha’s awkwardness and despair at hurting Clint turned to anger.  
“Clint, think about what you’re saying! You’ve been kidnapped before! You know what it’s like to be locked up! And you have NO IDEA what it was like down there! How I felt, sitting in the water, watching Loki die- because he was dying, Clint, as close to dying as he could have been before he somehow pulled himself up again. How helpless I felt!”  
Clint blinked a few times, seemingly clearing his head.  
“Of course. I.I.. just thought that you...liked me.”  
“Clint, I do like you. Just not in that way.”  
“Why not in that way? Why can’t there be an ‘us’?”  
“Because that’s not how it works, Clint! There can’t just magically be an ‘us’! Not when I don’t feel that way towards you! What don’t you understand?”  
Clint reached for her hand, but she stepped away. He kept moving towards her.  
“Just give me a chance, Natasha. I’ll show you that there can be-”  
She pulled her hand away from him again, and suddenly there was another voice in the room.  
“Barton.” Loki said clearly from the doorway. Clint turned away from Natasha.  
“Yes?” He asked, flushed.  
“Stark wants you. He’s in his lab.” Loki said, pointing behind him through the door.  
“Of...of course.” Clint said, taking his own bag of training gear and leaving the room. Loki’s eyes followed him until he vanished from sight.  
“Thanks.” Natasha said to Loki.  
“For what?” He asked in response.  
“For getting Clint away. Tony doesn’t actually need him, does he?”  
Loki smiled that oh so special grin.  
“Of course he does. Stark is currently discovering a wonderful mess of pink goo that he will certainly need help cleaning up.”  
Natasha let herself release the tension she’d been holding onto. She wondered just who had put the wonderful mess of pink goo in Tony’s lab.

Natasha sat in her room, thinking. Thinking about where she was in her life. She’d been in bad places before- the red room, prisons, the basement- but she was in a worse one now. Now she’d had a place where she was safe and happy, but she’d wrecked it. Living with Clint would never be the same. Talking to him would never be the same. Heck, even looking at him would never be the same! Clint. Wonderful, kind Clint. Clint, who she looked up to. Clint, who looked up to her. Clint, who she would give her life for. Who she knew she could never fall in love with. Who she knew she had hurt. She buried her head in her hands, then unburied it again. Her hands stunk of sweat from training and clenching them in tense fists. Shakily, she fiddled in a draw she barely ever opened. She pulled out a small bottle of perfume, rose scented. She hated perfume, but Clint had given it to her as a long ago birthday gift and she hadn’t been able to refuse. Clint again. Her hands trembling, she sprayed some onto each wrist, rubbing it in. She breathed deeply. There was something calming about it. Without thinking, she sprayed more on her neck. The rosy scent engulfed her. That moment, standing with the perfume bottle in her hands, she let go of her traumas, and knew that everything would be alright.

That night, despite the fun of the day (running away from a pink stained Tony), Loki’s nightmares came back worse than ever. 

Loki felt the water around him, cold and wet (as water usually was). Dirt and other things settled on his skin, irritating him. He tried to wipe the muck off, but his body burned every time he moved. His skin tingled horribly, begging to be free of the water. He was cold. He had never been cold before, being a frost giant. But he was cold now. Deeply, bone chillingly cold. And yet as he moved, the cold turned to a scalding heat, searing through him and giving him agony. The side of his body felt as though he was being stabbed over and over, tearing at the wound again and again. His eyes ached from the dim light, so he closed them. And there was nothing but pain. And then softly, a voice. Natasha’s voice, calling. Talking to him. He tried to respond, but he couldn’t make his body work anymore. He wanted to tell her that he was fine, that everything would be okay. But he couldn’t. So he did the only thing he could. He stopped fighting. He screamed.

Loki screamed. He didn’t realise he was actually screaming until he stopped, closing his mouth. It was only then that he realised that he was lying on the floor, his blankets tangled around him. He crawled away from them as though they were venomous monsters. He crawled into a corner and sat there with his head in his knees. The sobs came easily, but they were dry sobs. Slowly, he started choking on himself, his breathing seizing up. Emotions rushed into him, crushing him as he sat there, just begging for everything to end, for him to have peace for the first time in his life. But of course he was granted no such luck. Instead came the footsteps, rapid and soft, from across the hall. 

Natasha pushed Loki’s door open without knocking. She didn’t see him immediately. His bed was empty, the blankets all over the floor, spread awkwardly as though they wanted to twist and turn into snakes. Then her eyes adjusted to the darkness, and she saw him in the corner, his face buried in his knees. She moved towards him, and heard his rapid breathing. She ducked down beside him. She sat there, and put her arms around him, rubbing his back in a way that she hoped was comforting and not intruding.  
“Breathe, Loki, breathe.” She whispered. Loki’s panic slowly eased. He looked at her, ghosts in his eyes. Natasha had met those ghosts too many times before.  
“You’re remembering a bad place, aren’t you?” She asked. Slowly, Loki nodded.  
“Close your eyes. Tell me one thing you can smell.”  
“Something...something sweet.”  
Natasha realised what it was.  
“I’m wearing perfume. Now tell me one thing you can hear.” She said, lowering her voice a bit.  
“Cars.” Loki said without hesitation. Had there ever been a night when New York’s traffic hadn’t woken him?  
“Good, good. Tell me one thing you can feel.”  
Loki thought for a moment.  
“The floor beneath my feet.” He eventually said.  
“Open you eyes.”  
Loki opened them.  
“Tell me one thing you can see.”  
“Your..your eyes.”  
“Yes, Loki, yes. You can see my eyes, you can smell my perfume, you can hear the stupid cars and you can feel the carpet. You’re here, in this room, with me.”  
Loki finally relaxed completely. A few tears finally came, and he quickly wiped them away.  
“I think I know what bad place you were remembering.” Natasha said. They needed no more words. Loki nodded.  
“I have nightmares about it too.” Natasha said quietly. Loki nodded.  
“It’s..it’s funny. Nothing dramatic happened to me there, but yet...”  
“But yet it still haunt you?”  
“Yes.”  
Natasha put her arm back around him.  
“I was down there too, Loki. I know what it was like. You’re not alone.” She murmured.  
“Not alone.” Loki breathed, testing out the words that sounded unfamiliar together.  
“You can talk to me, Loki, if that’s what you need. You shouldn’t keep it all bottled up inside you. We were down there together. We can deal with this together, okay? Never alone, Loki. Always together.”  
Slowly, Loki nodded. They sat for a few more minutes.  
“Are you okay now?” Natasha asked.  
But Loki had already fallen asleep, for the first time feeling safe as he drifted off leaning against her.

Clint ran up to her as she walked in a corridor the next morning.  
“Natasha.” He said, out of breath from running.  
“Yes?” She asked. It was awkward.  
“Natasha, I’m sorry. I’m sorry about yesterday.”  
“Clint, it’s okay. I should be the one who-”  
“I was being stupid. I let some fairytale fantasy crawl into my head. I shouldn’t have pushed you.”  
“Clint-”  
“And if you want to be with Loki, it’s completely fine, because it’s your choice, not mine-”  
“Clint, I don’t love Loki, at least not in that way.”  
“But if you did, it would be absolutely and completely okay. I shouldn’t have-”  
“Clint! Shut up! It’s okay. Really.”  
“I...I got you something.”  
Clint shoved a slender and long box into her hands.  
“It’s a knife.” He said as she opened it.  
“What for?”  
“To stab me with if I ever try to do that again.”  
“Clint, it really is okay.”  
Eventually, he nodded. She hugged him.  
“Best friends, okay? Always best friends.”  
“Yes. Always best friends.”  
As Clint walked away, Natasha heard the faintest trace of a footstep behind her. She turned around.  
“You were watching all that, weren’t you?” She asked Loki, forever the resident eavesdropper. Loki nodded.  
“He did the right thing.” He said.  
“You’re...you’re right. He let me go.”  
Loki smiled.  
“It’s nice to know that you listened to at least one thing I told you down there.”  
And at that moment, looking at Natasha’s amused face, he felt his scars disappear.

**Author's Note:**

> Please give me feedback! (Constructive criticism is welcome, but please keep it nice!)


End file.
